In the present European War is being tested the enginery of destruction and slaughter that has been building and accumulating for half a century. It is the most stupendous experiment that the human race has ever tried. The magnitude of it confounds the senses; the horror obsesses the mind and stumps realization.

The influence of improvements in all kinds of weapons and machinery of war is further and further to complicate strategics. The more that invention, science, and discovery are employed in the development and perfection of implements of war, the more the use of those implements requires high inventive genius and high scientific skill.

Before the outbreak of the war there were many military engines awaiting a practical trial in actual service, among them the dirigible balloon. During a period of forty years the nations of the world have been obliged to do a good deal of guessing, in spite of calculations based on previous experience in wars whose mechanism was very simple and crude as compared with the present engines of war. But the improvements in weapons employed on terra firma did not constitute so far a step away from experience as engines of aËrial warfare. Those engines of war which have been mainly the subjects of guess-work are the aËroplane and that dreadnought of the air, the Zeppelin, especially the latter. The advent of the aËroplane introduced an entirely new set of problems.

Before the advent of the aËroplane, the navigation of the air was confined to the balloon. Contrary to expectation, the aËroplane, instead of putting the balloon out of the race, served only to stimulate higher development of the balloon, with the result that the dirigible balloon and the aËroplane have been developed side by side.

From the outset, it was recognized that the chief desideratum in the development of the aËroplane consisted in greater stability, and especially in automatic equilibration.

The first aËroplanes were very imperfect. At the time of the early exhibitions which I witnessed, it was necessary to plan them to take place in the calm of the evening, just before sundown. The aËroplane could not go up in a wind. No aËronaut would have undertaken to go up except when there was no wind. Even a moderate breeze made them quite unmanageable. Now, however, the aËroplane can rise in a gale of wind, and fly right into the teeth of a hurricane.

The old-style balloon could only go with the wind. It could make no headway against it, but had to float like a feather on the lightest breeze. The modern dirigible, however, which has reached its highest degree of perfection in the Zeppelin, can travel through still air at a speed of sixty miles an hour, the speed of a gale of wind, and can brave a fifty-mile gale at a speed of ten miles an hour. This is altogether remarkable when we take into account the fact that the Zeppelin, with all its load, must be lighter than air, and therefore, for its size, lighter than the fluffiest eiderdown.

Limitations of the AËrial Bomb

Aviation makes a strong appeal to the imagination, and this fact, together with errors and misconceptions in the popular mind concerning the use and power of high explosives, has led to many strange predictions and weird conclusions about the destruction which dirigibles and aËroplanes would be capable of doing by dropping bombs from the sky.

Since the advent of aviation, many inventors have directed their energies to aËrial bombs and bomb-dropping appliances. There have been, from time to time, fearful forecasts of the destruction of warships, coast fortifications, and large cities; for it was claimed that air-craft would be able to drop explosive bombs capable of wrecking the heaviest battleship and of blowing up coast fortifications and utterly laying waste cities and towns. It was predicted that the aËroplane would be able, with its bombs, to scatter armies like chaff before the whirlwind.

The hopes of those who have believed in such dire destructiveness of bomb-dropping from air-craft have been dashed to the ground, with the bombs they have dropped. Of course, aviators may drop any form of infernal machine which, on exploding, will mangle by-standers with fragments of scrap iron, but the effect must necessarily be very local.

The most effective use aviators can make of bombs and infernal machines is to destroy one another in the sky and to attack magazines and storehouses, wireless stations, hangars, and balloon-sheds within the enemy's lines, and beyond the reach of other means of attack. Also, in connection with the attack of advancing troops, aËrial bombs dropped from aËroplanes may be used with effect, especially in disentrenching an enemy. At sea, too, with the latest types of aËroplane, bombs of sufficient size and weight and power of penetration may be used destructively against unarmored or light-armored war-vessels. A more efficient means, however, than has yet been adopted is needed to secure the required accuracy. Naturally, such bombs are admirably adapted to the destruction of dirigible balloons. The swift-winged aviator is able to manoeuvre at will around and above a huge dirigible and to attack it from any quarter.

There is probably no one subject about which there is more popular error than concerning the use and destructive effects of high explosives.

An anarchist once attempted to blow up London Bridge with two small sticks of dynamite, and succeeded merely in getting himself into trouble. At another time, a dynamiter entered the Houses of Parliament and exploded ten pounds of dynamite in one of the large corridors, with the result that it only made a hole in the floor and smashed a few windows.

As a matter of fact, airships are capable of working comparatively small damage by dropping bombs, unless the bombs can be made to hit and penetrate the object struck before exploding, for the reason that, unless confined, explosives have but little effect.

When a mass of high explosive is detonated upon a firm, resisting body, like the earth, or the deck of a battleship, or armor-plate, the effect is to rebound from the resisting body with small result. For example, when a mass of high explosive is set off on the earth's surface, the ball of incandescent gases bounds upward, spreading out in the form of an inverted cone. While it will blow a hole of considerable size into the ground, still the effect in a horizontal plane is practically nil. The windows of buildings standing in the vicinity of an explosion of this character are not blown inward, but are blown outward in the direction of the explosion by atmospheric reaction.

At Sandy Hook, several years ago, an experiment was tried with two hundred pounds of guncotton exploded against a twelve-inch plate, immediately back of which were placed a cage containing a rooster and a hen, and another cage containing a dog. The guncotton was hung against the plate and detonated. The effect upon the plate was nil. On examination, it was found that the dog and the two fowl had been made rather hard of hearing. That was the only noticeable effect upon the animals.

We all remember the test of the big, eighteen-inch Gathmann gun at Sandy Hook about twelve years ago, which threw a bomb containing six hundred pounds of compressed guncotton that was exploded against the face of a twelve-inch Kruppized plate. The first shot produced no visible effect except a yellow smudge on the face of the plate. It took three shots even to crack the plate and to shift it in its setting.

In competition with the Gathmann gun, a twelve-inch army rifle was fired against another plate of the same size and thickness and mounted in the same manner. The projectile contained only twenty-three pounds of Maximite. Yet, as the projectile penetrated the plate before the Maximite was exploded, a hole was blown through it a yard wide, and it was broken into several pieces.

These tests proved the effectiveness of even a small quantity of high explosive when properly confined, as by explosion after penetration, and the utter ineffectiveness of a large mass of high explosive when not confined or when exploded on the outside of a body.

Bombs carried by an airship and dropped upon the deck of a battleship may damage the superstructure a little, but they can have no material effect upon the ship itself, unless they are made heavy enough and strong enough, with the proper armor-piercing shape, and are dropped from a sufficient height to pierce the deck. Not unless the bomb can be made to penetrate an object before exploding can it effect much destruction.

At Santiago, the Vesuvius, with its pneumatic guns, threw several six-hundred-pound bombs, and exploded them on the Spanish fortifications, but the effect was wholly insignificant.

Several years ago, when the subway was being built, a dynamite magazine accidentally exploded in front of the Murray Hill Hotel. The magazine probably contained at least a ton of dynamite. A lot of windows were broken in the vicinity, some persons were injured, and a multitude badly scared, but the damage done even to the Murray Hill Hotel was comparatively small.

It has been predicted that Germany would send across the Channel a large fleet of airships and blow up British towns with the bombs that her great gas-bags might drop out of the heavens.

Now, at last, the much-vaunted and long-anticipated Zeppelin invasion has come, and what is the result? Four peaceful citizens killed, and about ten thousand dollars' worth of property damage.

Let us suppose that the Germans should send a fleet of a hundred airships to drop bombs upon the city of London, returning to Germany each day for a new supply; and let us suppose that each airship should carry explosives enough to destroy two houses every day, which would be far more than they could actually average. Yet, if this aËrial fleet should be able to destroy two hundred houses a day, or say, roughly, sixty thousand houses a year, it would succeed in destroying just about the annual growth of London, for that city has, during the past ten years, built sixty thousand new houses every year.

The dirigible balloon has one signal advantage over the aËroplane in the matter of bomb-dropping. It can both carry bigger bombs and remain stationary and hover while it drops them. With the aËroplane, however, there is necessarily great difficulty in hitting underlying objects, on account of the high speed at which it must travel to sustain flight. In order to float, an aËroplane must travel about thirty miles an hour. Even at this speed, it is moving forward at the rate of forty-four feet a second, and as a bomb travels at the same speed as the aËroplane, except for the retardation of the air, it moves forward forty-four feet the first second, while dropping sixteen feet. The next second the bomb falls sixty-four feet and moves forward forty-four feet, and so on.

Sixty miles an hour is a moderate speed for an aËroplane, however, and at that speed the bomb travels forward eighty-eight feet per second when it is dropped, so that, during the first second, while it descends but sixteen feet, it moves forward eighty-eight feet. It falls sixty-four feet the next second, and moves forward eighty-eight feet, and so on, descending in a parabolic curve, so that, by the time it strikes the earth, it may be several hundred feet from the place at which it is aimed.

Although the dirigible balloon, a Zeppelin, for example, may hover in a stationary position at will when dropping bombs, still it constitutes such an enormous target that it must fly very high in order to keep out of range of gun-fire. Guns are now made which can reach air-craft at the height of two miles. At that height, or at half that height, there can be but little accuracy in bomb-dropping, even from the stationary Zeppelin.

The efficiency of a fighting machine is exactly proportionate to the amount of life and property that it can destroy in a given time with the minimum exposure of property and life in order to do the work. If a fleet of a dozen Zeppelins should be able to attack and destroy an entire British fortified town like Dover, it would be a good investment. If, however, the loss that it would be able to inflict upon the enemy were only equal to the loss that the British would inflict upon it, then it would be a bad investment, or at least, an investment without profit, for the reason that, in war, it is poor policy to risk the destruction of a valuable war-engine merely for the destruction of what may be termed non-belligerent property of an enemy, such as the dwellings of the inhabitants of a city.

Suppose, for example, that a couple of Zeppelins should be able to destroy houses in a British town having a value ten times as great as the value of one of the Zeppelins, and, in the attack, should lose one of the Zeppelins, it would not be a profitable raid, for a Zeppelin, being useful for scouting purposes, is a potential factor in deciding the issue of the war, whereas the houses have practically no bearing on the issue of the war.

It is good policy to use both men and machinery of war only for the destruction of men and machinery of an enemy, and not for the destruction of non-combatant inhabitants and property.

Much has been said about gun-fire from air-craft upon underlying troops. A man standing on the earth, being seen endwise, presents a much smaller target to the vertical fire of the air-man than he presents when fired at horizontally from the earth, because in the one case he is seen end-to, and in the other case side-to. Besides, several other men may be exposed to the horizontal fire. The air-man, however, is a conspicuous target, and if his machine is hit and crippled the result is fatal to him.

AËroplane and Dirigible Compared

As I have for many years predicted, the chief use of air-craft, whether aËroplane or dirigible balloon, is for purposes of reconnaissance.

This war has amply demonstrated the fact that air-craft are of enormous value. They have rendered surprises in force practically impossible. Each side has been able to keep itself fully aware of the numbers and disposition of opposing troops.

The aËroplane costs but a fraction of what the Zeppelin costs, while the Zeppelin presents a target enormously larger. It constitutes a target so big as to make the broad side of a barn blush with envy.

As one effective hit will bring down either aËroplane or Zeppelin alike, obviously, the aËroplane has the advantage over the Zeppelin, as a target, equal to the difference in size multiplied by the difference in cost. Furthermore, the aËroplane is far more mobile and more rapid in flight than the Zeppelin.

In judging of the value of the Zeppelin for purposes of reconnaissance on land, as compared with the aËroplane, we must take into account the fact that a large number of aËroplanes can be built for the cost of a single Zeppelin, and manned with the crew of a single Zeppelin, and that these many aËroplanes, operating in concert, will be able to do much more effective work than one Zeppelin.

If the Allies would be good enough not to shoot at them, Zeppelins might be very efficient indeed, hovering along the battle-front. These dirigibles have been very conspicuous for their absence from the battle-front in the war.

The use of the Zeppelin as a troop-ship has yet to be proven, and its value for the purpose will depend upon how it compares with the aËroplane for the same purpose. AËroplanes capable of carrying at least a dozen soldiers each, with the arms and equipment of a raider's outfit, can now be built. Obviously, as a large number of such aËroplanes can be built at the cost of a single Zeppelin, and as the aËroplane can travel even faster than the Zeppelin, the Zeppelin cannot for one moment compare with the aËroplane, even for the purpose of carrying troops.

There is one purpose, however, for which the Zeppelin is admirably adapted, where it is much superior to the aËroplane, and it is for reconnaissance over sea. The Zeppelin can hang on the sky and scan the sea as a hawk scans a field for its prey; and as it can carry a wireless apparatus capable of transmitting messages to a distance of two hundred miles or more, it can keep the German fleet constantly informed of the positions of the British fleet in the near seas. It is thus able to direct a sortie of ships when the numbers and disposition of the enemy's ships are such as to insure success.

The Zeppelin has also a very important use in the detection of submarines, for the reason that from a vertical position submarines, under favorable conditions, can easily be seen at considerable depths below the surface, and the Zeppelin, with its long-range wireless, is able promptly to report such valuable information.

I am of the opinion that the Germans have planned and built their Zeppelins mainly for oversea fighting against England, and for a prospective invasion of England. I think they must have been disappointed in the lack of destructiveness that their bombs have had when dropped from Zeppelins, while the moral effect on England must also have been disappointing.

From the point of German advantage, it would be a good plan to frighten the British if it would take the fight out of them, but it is a very bad plan to frighten the British if it puts more fight into them. The Zeppelin raids have certainly had the effect of stimulating the British fighting spirit.

It is especially regrettable that the United States Government did not heartily co-operate with the Wright Brothers to lead the world in the development of the aËroplane; but nothing of the sort was done. "We have," as Congressman Gardner says, "been experimenting and expecting and reporting and contracting and considering—in fact, we have been doing everything except building aËroplanes."

The Wright Brothers, however, were received with glad foreign embrace. They were generously encouraged abroad, both by co-operative and competitive experiments and by liberal purchases. The result was that, on the breaking out of the European War, France, for example, had 1,400 aËroplanes, while the United States had but twenty-three, mostly obsolete. The United States Government has followed its time-honored custom of allowing its naval and military inventions to be developed and perfected abroad before adoption here.

Prior to the outbreak of the European War, this government ordered from abroad an up-to-date French aËroplane with two Salmson motors, and one of the latest German aËroplanes with two Mercedes motors, with the intention of building a few of these machines. Then came the European War. The American purchases were commandeered, and we were thereby prevented from acquiring the much-desired air-craft.

The de Bange obturator, an indispensable part of the breech mechanism of all large guns, was originally an American invention, but this Government allowed it to be developed and perfected abroad and given a foreign name.

Ericsson's Monitor was taken up by Europeans, right where its private builders left it, and it has been developed, mainly in England, into the modern super-dreadnought.

The interchangeable system of manufacture of small arms was developed and perfected in America, but received no encouragement from the government. This system is now universally employed in the manufacture of small arms, and also in the manufacture of all kinds of machinery. It is for this reason that we are able to get a spare part for an automobile that will fit in place perfectly without having it specially made. Before the advent of the interchangeable system of manufacture of firearms, a sportsman in England went to his gunsmith to be measured for a shotgun just as he went to his tailor to be measured for a suit of clothes. At that time, no two guns were made exactly alike, and no piece of one gun would fit any other gun, while now all the parts of one gun will fit in the places of corresponding parts in every other gun of the same pattern.

The year the United States Government adopted multi-perforated smokeless powder, Congress appropriated only $30,000 for smokeless powder, the orders to be divided among the different manufacturers. This meant that inventors, like myself, who had started in a small way, were driven out of business. I went to England with my multi-perforated smokeless-powder grain, which had been adopted by the United States Government, but found it hard to get foreign manufacturers to recognize either the superiority of the multi-perforated grain or of the pure nitro-cellulose powder. The excessive erosion, however, of guns used in the present war, due to the use of powders containing a high percentage of nitroglycerin, is already making those countries using nitroglycerin powders look longingly to the superior smokeless powder used in the United States.

The United States Government has as yet taken no steps worth considering toward the obtainment of Zeppelins, or any other practical dirigible balloon. At the present time, there is not one in the American service.

At the outbreak of hostilities abroad, France had 22 dirigibles and 1,400 aËroplanes; Russia, 18 dirigibles and 800 aËroplanes; Great Britain, 9 dirigibles and 400 aËroplanes; Belgium, 2 dirigibles and 100 aËroplanes; Germany, 40 dirigibles and 1,000 aËroplanes; Austria, 8 dirigibles and 400 aËroplanes; while the United States had, as I have mentioned, only 23 aËroplanes, mostly obsolete.

Last year, the Secretary of the Navy appointed a Board to investigate the subject of aviation for the Navy, and to make recommendations. The Board recommended the appropriation of $1,300,000 for that year, but Congress cut off the first left-hand numeral and appropriated the sum of $350,000 for the purpose.

The present war has demonstrated that air-craft are the eyes of both armies and navies. If the Wright Brothers could have come to the country's aid in the Spanish War, the American fleet would not have remained in doubt outside Santiago Harbor. Before the advent of aviation, one of the chief desiderata to a commanding officer was to find out what the enemy was doing behind the hill. Without the aËroplane, it is impossible to prevent surprises in force, and to avoid the deadly ambuscade. The aËroplane is absolutely indispensable for the location of masked batteries. It is impossible, without aËroplanes, even to approximate the number and disposition of troops to which an army may be opposed. It is necessary to have not only a sufficient number of aËroplanes, especially designed and equipped for this purpose, but also other aËroplanes, armed and equipped, to co-operate with them, and defend them against attack from the aËroplanes of the enemy. Just as dreadnoughts require battle-cruisers, and both require torpedo-boat destroyers, and all require other scout-ships and submarines, for co-operation against a fleet of an enemy, so do dirigibles and the different types of aËroplanes, according to their purpose, require one another for concert of action.

What we have already seen of battles fought in the sky leads us to surmise that aËrial battles of the future will be fought on a much larger scale. It will be found that the commander who expects to conquer the ground held by an enemy must first conquer the sky. Aviation carries war into the third dimension.

Not only must the advance or retirement of troops be supported by artillery thundering from hill to hill, but also the troops must be supported and guided by pilots in the sky.

The last Congress appropriated $1,000,000 for the aviation purposes of the Navy. It is the same million dollars that was cut from last year's appropriation, which ought to have been expended for the purpose during that period.

It is a strange paradox that America, which has led the world in discovery and invention as applied to the industrial arts and sciences, should follow the rest of the world in their adoption by the Army and Navy. The trouble is not with the bureaus and boards of the Army and Navy, which have merely the power to recommend such things, but it is the fault of Congressional false economy. As long as we allow other nations to lead us, both in the character and quantity of naval and military equipment, we are destined always to be weaker than other nations in that equipment; consequently, when war comes, we spend money with the extravagance of frenzy to remedy the defect. We economized before the War of 1812, and during that war we wasted ten times as much as we had saved by our economy. We had disqualified ourselves by our economies to such an extent before the outbreak of the great Civil War that this conflict became one of the most deadly and most expensive in the history of the world. What we saved by our economies, compared to what we lost by them on that occasion is like a drop of water to a river of water. But we failed to profit by the experience, and, when the Spanish War broke out, we spent money with all the lavishness of prodigal inefficiency.

If we could only be as wise as we have been lessoned by our sad experience, we would immediately take adequate measures to forefend ourselves against a repetition of such experiences; and one of those measures would be the building of an aËrial fleet commensurate with our large needs.